


Mercury Scatters

by Northland



Category: Neuromancer - William Gibson
Genre: Gen, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-25
Updated: 2008-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-25 01:53:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1625312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northland/pseuds/Northland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"There's no such thing as an old razorgirl." Molly vignette written for Yuletide Madness.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mercury Scatters

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tvashti](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tvashti/gifts).



A short treat for Yuletide Madness. Hope you enjoy, tvashti!

*

When she wakes, Molly's fingertips are sunk deep into the temperfoam mattress. She draws them out delicately and examines each blade extruded from beneath a nail for any clinging shreds of plastic before sheathing it. While she does that, she remembers where she is and why: Vancouver, grey and half-drowned under bruised skies, and she has a meeting tonight. She blows a shard of foam off her left thumb blade. So much work to keep passably clean. If she'd realized infection would be such an everpresent bitch to fight off, even with expensive custom nanos to scrub her blood, she might not have chosen such a flashy mod.

She grins into the empty hotel room. Like she'd have picked anything else. Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly, and a razorgirl's gotta cut.

The blades have drawbacks besides the way blood dulls the tempered alloy. Molly refuses to think about why she's never used them during sex, even when a little scratch would have been a lot of fun, but she knows. And even though she does not, will not think about the blades during sex, something about them still reminds her of her meatpuppet days. Not just that that's how she earned them, letting people use her body while she wasn't home inside it to care, but something about the way her instincts take over after the blades come out, making her a passenger behind the shades as she flays an arm to bone... it's creepy. Molly enjoys her work. She wants to be present for it, not passively watching.

They shouldn't have come out in her sleep, either. She turns her right hand over and stares at its long fingers, only slightly swollen knuckles -- the best Indonesian anti-aging work money can buy -- and glossy burgundy nails. She stopped wearing red polish after the first few months; Molly's not subtle, but there's obvious and then there's obvious.

The doctors promised her the blades were under voluntary muscle control only, absolutely no connection to the autonomous nervous system. Wouldn't be the first time the bastards lied. Still, she's never woken with them out until the last month or so. Five times in eight weeks, twice in the last ten days. Molly can read a rising graph as well as anyone.

_There's no such thing as an old razorgirl. You knew it when you signed on._

No wrinkles on her pale face, no grey in her dark hair, and her body is as lithe as it was at seventeen. Warm liquid fills Molly's mouth. She lunges for the polished steel toilet, expecting the sting of nausea and belly cramps to follow, but crouches on the slate floor for three minutes. Nothing happens. She straightens, slowly, and stares into the mirror. A silver-eyed alien looks back at her, and Molly remembers what it felt like to cry.


End file.
